1. Technical Field
The present disclosure relates to storage area networks.
2. Description of the Related Art
Storage Area Networks (SANs) are computer systems in which large mass storage devices such as Redundant Array of Independent Disks (RAID) devices are connected to a central processor or processors via high-speed network technology (as opposed to, for example, via a system bus). SANs are increasingly used to store vast amounts of information and their usage has grown exponentially with the rise of the Internet. Individual physical storage devices may be identified using a Logical Unit Number (LUN). The devices themselves are then often informally referred to as LUNs as well.
Virtualization of the storage area network allows for the organization of the physical devices to be hidden from users. This allows multiple Virtual LUNs (VLUNs) to be created for a single LUN, which gives users of each VLUN the sense that they are accessing there own LUN even though the physical device itself is shared among multiple users.